UPDATE: A Victory for the Florida College Student Who Stood Up for His Faith - CBN News Gary Lane,Aisha Bascom

UPDATE: A Victory for the Florida College Student Who Stood Up for His Faith

March 29, 2017 CBN News Gary Lane, Aisha Bascom

CBN News has received word that Rollins College has reinstated conservative Christian student Marshall Polston. Polston was suspended from all classes and college activities after he challenged a Muslim professor's anti-Christian statements.

Maeghan Rempala, Rollins College Director of Community Standards and Responsibility sent Polston a letter today (March 31, 2017) notifying him of his reinstatement saying that " Responsibility has found" that he had not crossed the threshold of violating the college's Code of Community Standards. The letter said evidence presented did show that Polston had been "aggressive, disrespectful and at times vulgar in multiple verbal and electronic communications with faculty, staff and students."

Watch to see this update from Polston and hear what he says about his reinstatement:

Polston made one fatal mistake, challenging his Muslim professor who argued that the disciples didn't believe Jesus was God and that the crucifixion was a hoax. That's when the 21-year-old sophomore at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida said his professor started gunning for him and his troubles began.

"It was very off-putting and flat out odd. I've traveled the Middle East, lectured at the Salahaddin University, and immersed myself in Muslim culture for many years. Honestly, it reminded me of some of the more radical groups I researched when abroad," Marshall Polston told Central Florida Post.

Polston said up till that point he was a straight-A student, but that all changed when his professor retaliated and gave him a 52% on an essay.

"I was upset, understandably. I've never gotten anything less than straight A's," Polston explained. "So, I was really interested in figuring out how to possibly improve or at least understand the grade."

Shortly after, Muslim Humanities professor Areeje Zufari reported Rollins to the "Dean of Safety" claiming she felt unsafe to even conduct class. But The CF Post reports that Zufari gave conflicting statements to the school and police as to why she felt threatened by Polston.

When Zufari resumed classes Polston said he was challenged a second time by a radical Muslim student who suggested a "good punishment for gays, adulterers, and thieves was the removal of a certain body part, as determined by Sharia law."

"It took a few seconds for me to realize that he actually said that, especially after what this community has faced with the tragic loss of life at Pulse," Polston recalled.

The conservative Christian student said the radical statement unnerved him and several other classmates, but it was only his responses that were reported to school authorities, leading to a meeting with the Dean where he was informed that his behavior was making the campus "unsafe."

In an interview with our Gary Lane, Polston provided details of his disciplinary hearing.

"It's really amazing when I got to the school they had five police officers there, they had two investigators, or two detectives and they had campus security everywhere and nothing for the young man who said that it was okay to chop off a hand,"  he explained.

"They made it clear that they had not gotten a report about what the student said, and were more concerned about the danger I was causing to the campus," Polston said. "What danger? A difference of opinion in a college classroom is nothing out of the ordinary and certainly not dangerous. It was surreal and degrading. The bad grade was upsetting, but they were literally refusing to acknowledge the dangers posed by someone who advocated chopping off body parts on campus."

Last Friday, Polston was alerted in a letter from the school administration that his actions "constituted a threat of disruption," and resulted in a "summary suspension."

"It was really reprehensible that I was shut down for voicing my opinion," he told CBN News.

The private liberal college was in the media in 2013 after kicking the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship off campus for not allowing non-Christian students to hold leadership positons, a violation of the college's anti-discrimination policy.  In that same year students were banned from having Bible studies in the common areas of their dorm suites.

Polston told CBN News he thinks Rollins College should have done a more thurough background check on Professor Zufari.

"Her connections to these organizations, her history this was all something they should have known before and I guess they just didn't do due diligence."

Court documents show Professor Zufari was one of three defendants named in a 2007 lawsuit filed by Rosine Collin Ghawji.

In the complaint, Mrs. Ghawji alleged that her estranged husband, Dr. Maher Ghawji and Ms. Zufari "conspired to in effect terrorize"  her and their two children.

She claimed that Maher Ghawji told the children "he would be proud if they blew themselves up for Allah because it would be glorification of their lives." The complaint also states that Mr. Ghawji told Mrs. Ghawji that "he would rather see the children dead than them not being fundamentalist Muslims."

The Orlando Sentinel quotes Zufari telling a school administrator, "You know I would almost be laughing if I could summon the humor.  In my real life, I'm actually a pretty boring person."

But Zufari's reported ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and radical Wahhabi Islam are no laughing matter.

The 2007 Orange County court complaint includes allegations that Professor Zufari was secretly married to Mrs. Ghawji's husband Maher. Together they traveled to Seattle, Washington to conduct "targeting and surveillance" of American interests.  

The Central Florida Post reports Mrs. Ghawji worked for the FBI as "a source for years to inform on her husband's email activity and conversations with contacts in the Middle East."

The CFP says Maher Ghawji "had ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and donated thousands of dollars to charities that funneled money to Al-Qaeda."

The Post also reported that Zufari once defended the anti-Semitic statements of  Sheik Abdur-Rahman Al-Sudai who appeared on Saudi television saying that "Jews needed to be 'annihilated" and that he referred to Jews as "the scum of the human race, rats of the world, the killers of prophets, and the grandsons of monkeys and pigs."

According to the CFP, Zufari led the effort to bring the Sheikh to speak at a conference in Kissimmee and was also involved in promoting an event with Brooklyn Imam Siraj Wihaj, one of the named co-conspirators in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center.

CBN News was unable to contact Professor Zufari for comment. She has refused to respond to other media requests.

Rollins College President Grant Cornwell released a statement to the campus community saying, "As an institution of higher learning we value the exploratiion of a broad diversity of beliefs, identities, backgrounds and faith traditions, and welcome those who manifest them in our community."

So, what would Polston like to see happen?

He says the college should reinstate him and Professor Zufari should be dismissed from her duties.

"I think that they realized that they maybe had made a mistake… there are certainly groups I think within every organization in academia today in America that are out on a witch hunt—in my opinion against Christian students like me. "

He still believes that "Rollins is a great school," he" loves it" and would like to continue his studies there.

Watch the video to hear Polston talk about the ordeal and how it has affected his faith.

Mention the Name Jesus in Hollywood and All Hell Breaks Loose - BILL DONOHUE/ CATHOLIC LEAGUE FOR RELIGIOUS AND CIVIL RIGHTS CHARISMA NEWS

The Barna Group recently conducted a survey of Republicans and Democrats asking them whether Hollywood is biased against Christianity. It found that 32 percent of Republicans, and 5 percent of Democrats, believe that Hollywood generally portrays Christianity in a negative way. (Eva Luedin)

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Mention the Name Jesus in Hollywood and All Hell Breaks Loose

7/22/2016 BILL DONOHUE/ CATHOLIC LEAGUE FOR RELIGIOUS AND CIVIL RIGHTS   CHARISMA NEWS

The Barna Group recently conducted a survey of Republicans and Democrats asking them whether Hollywood is biased against Christianity. It found that 32 percent of Republicans, and 5 percent of Democrats, believe that Hollywood generally portrays Christianity in a negative way.

We know from other surveys that Republicans are much more likely to attend religious services on a regular basis than Democrats, and that the latter are home to most agnostics, atheists and the unaffiliated. It therefore does not surprise to learn that Democrats are more inclined not to see Hollywood's portrayal of Christianity in a negative light; such depictions are more likely to be seen as accurate representations.

The anti-Christian bias is not new to Hollywood. Over a decade ago, actress Jennifer O'Neill remarked that "If you mention the name Jesus Christ in Hollywood, all hell breaks loose." Right about that time, Mel Gibson validated her observation when he tried to find a studio for "The Passion of the Christ."

In 1997, John Dart wrote for the Los Angeles Times that "Hollywood and organized religion have regarded each other with deep suspicion, and sometimes open hostility, since the days of the flickering silents." But it never got really bad until the 1980s, and while things have turned around somewhat, it is no credit to the big Hollywood studios that they have.

"Frustrated with Hollywood, which shied away from making films with spiritual themes or religious characters," wrote Andre Chautard for the Los Angeles Times in 2002, "a handful of independent producers are striking out on their own to make Christian-themed films to entertain more than preach."

Hollywood should start treating Christians the way it treats gays. But then the moguls would have to suffer blowback from some in their own party. 

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Preachers That Are Saying It Is ‘Anti-Christian’ To Get Prepared Are Being Exceedingly Irresponsible - Michael Snyder THE ECONOMIC COLLAPSE BLOG

Preachers That Are Saying It Is ‘Anti-Christian’ To Get Prepared Are Being Exceedingly Irresponsible Posted: 19 Apr 2016   Michael Snyder  THE ECONOMIC COLLAPSE BLOG Is it “anti-faith” to prepare for the very hard times that are coming?  You would be surprised at how many Christians believe that this is true.  Recently, I have been reading a number of articles by Christian leaders that take the position that Christians should not be preppers, and not too long ago I watched two very well known ministers actually mock the idea of preparing for the future on a major Christian television show.  To me, this is exceedingly irresponsible.   If you don’t want to do anything to get prepared for the very difficult years that are coming that is your business, but don’t urge multitudes of your fellow believers to go down that road with you. In Matthew 24, Jesus describes what conditions will be like just prior to His return, and He told us that one of the things that we can expect is famine… 7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines, epidemics, and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of sorrows. Jesus promises us that famine is coming, and if we truly are entering the period of time that the Bible refers to as “the last days”, this is one of the things that we should fully expect to see. And yet there are very prominent preachers out there that have taken the liberty to mock other preachers that are actually encouraging their flocks to store up food and supplies. Well, what are those mocking preachers going to do when things get really crazy and the people in their own congregations don’t have anything to eat? Are those preachers going to personally feed all of them? If you can see what is coming and you don’t warn the people, you are going to be responsible for what happens to them. Without a doubt, it is very clear in the Scriptures that we are not to fear and that we are not to worry.  We are repeatedly commanded to trust God with everything in our lives, but does “having faith” mean that we sit back on our couches watching television while we wait for God to do everything for us? Of course not. Radical faith almost always involves radical action.  God tells us what to do, and then He expects us to trust Him enough to do what He has instructed us to do. If faith really means doing nothing while God does everything, then why would any of us ever go to work? Why wouldn’t we just sit back and wait for God to miraculously zap the money that we need into our bank accounts for us? And why do those that are “living by faith” ever fill up their vehicles with gasoline? Why don’t they just “trust God” to fill up their tanks every time? Look, without a doubt God can do incredible supernatural things that require absolutely no participation on our part.  I know that this is true, because it has happened to me many times.  But the vast majority of the time God works with us and through us.  He requires us to take challenging steps of faith and obedience, and in the process He leads us, He guides us, He blesses us and He opens doors for us. Just look at the example of Noah.  God could have certainly built an ark for Noah, or He could have zapped Noah up to some sort of “heavenly waiting area” while the flood happened. But He didn’t do either of those things. Instead, God ordered Noah to build a boat that was approximately the size of a World War II aircraft carrier, and then He watched as Noah and his family spent years doing exactly that. Noah was the very first “prepper” in the Bible, and his radical faith resulted in radical action.  In Hebrews 11:7, Noah is commended for this… 7 By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith. Unfortunately, many Christian leaders today mock this kind of effort.  They seem to believe that if God wants them to survive what is coming then He will do everything for them. Another example that we see in the Scriptures is Joseph.  In Genesis chapter 41, God showed Joseph that there would be seven good years followed by seven lean years in the land of Egypt. So how did Joseph respond? He didn’t sit back and relax knowing that seven good years were ahead.  Instead, he implemented the greatest “emergency food storage project” that the world had seen up until that time. By heeding God’s warning and taking radical action, he ended up saving the nation of Egypt and his entire family as well. I don’t get why more Christians can’t seem to understand these things.  So many of them even admit that incredibly hard times are coming, and yet they accuse me of being “anti-faith” because I am constantly urging my readers to get prepared. The following is an excerpt from one email that was sent to me by a fellow believer some time ago… “Now, although I agree with you about the things you write about the corruption of the financial system, and that there will be a collapse, yet I do not agree with you in promoting people to be self-sufficient contrary to the Lord’s teaching. If you truly have God then no provision needs to be made at all for yourself, just trust in God’s providence alone.” Just consider the implications of what this person was saying.  If “no provision needs to be made at all for yourself”, then we should all quit our jobs, empty our bank accounts, quit saving for retirement and cancel our health insurance. Personally, I want to be radical in trusting God, but trusting God almost always involves doing something. There are so many passages in the Bible that speak about working hard and preparing for the future.  For instance, the following bit of wisdom found in Proverbs 6:6-11 comes from the Modern English Version… 6 Go to the ant, you sluggard!     Consider her ways and be wise. 7 Which, having no guide,     overseer, or ruler, 8 provides her bread in the summer,     and gathers her food in the harvest. 9 How long will you sleep, O sluggard?     When will you arise out of your sleep? 10 Yet a little sleep, a little slumber,     a little folding of the hands to sleep— 11 so will your poverty come upon you like a stalker,     and your need as an armed man. Approximately one out of every 25 verses in the New Testament is about the last days.  God obviously wants us to understand what we are going to be facing, and just like Noah and Joseph, He expects us to take appropriate action. Unfortunately, most evangelical Christians have been taught that there isn’t any need to get prepared for the future because they are going to be taken off the planet before anything really bad happens.  For the first 1800 years of the Christian era, the church did not teach this, but over the past 200 years this new doctrine has become dominant in the western world.  It is called “the pre-Tribulation rapture”, and I grew up believing it too. But you won’t find it anywhere in the Bible.  In my new book entitled “The Rapture Verdict“, I spend 37 chapters conclusively proving that Jesus does not come back and gather His bride until the Tribulation is over.  It is the clearest and most comprehensive work on the subject anywhere out there, and it is turning out to be one of the most controversial Christian books of 2016. And even if you believe that a pre-Tribulation rapture is coming, the truth is that America is going to fall before we even get to the Tribulation.  This is something that I also cover in my book. So no matter what your view on Christian eschatology is, we all need to be getting prepared to face the exceedingly difficult times that are immediately ahead of us. But just like in the days of Noah, most people are going to ignore the warnings, and the mockers are going to continue to mock until judgment begins. I always expected that unbelievers would mock, but I never expected that so many Christian leaders would gleefully join the mocking. In the end, they and their followers will pay a very great price for not listening to the warnings and not getting prepared while they still had time. *About the author: Michael Snyder is the founder and publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog. Michael’s controversial new book about Bible prophecy entitled “The Rapture Verdict” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.*

Wanted: A Million More Bold Christians Like Kim Davis

     Matt Barber believes Christians should follow Kim Davis' example. (Reuters/Marlene Steele)

Wanted: A Million More Bold Christians Like Kim Davis

 9/8/2015 MATT BARBER  charisma news

For the first time in American history a woman has been imprisoned by the government for merely exercising her Christian faith. War has been declared on Christ and His followers.

And there's no turning back.

Anti-Christian persecution is the civil rights cause of our time. The cultural Marxists in power have seceded from our constitutional republican form of government, with its Judeo-Christian moorings, and have supplanted, in its place, a secular-socialist oligarchy. Like Union troops hunkered at Fort Sumter, faithful Christians are now exiles in our own land. Anti-Christian "progressives" have demanded unconditional surrender, and federal Judge David Bunning has fired the first mortar.

Even as I write, a kind, soft-spoken and well-respected civil servant of 27 years sits languishing, like some violent criminal, in a Kentucky prison. She is confined, indefinitely and without benefit of a trial, to a tiny cell. She is a political prisoner in a spiritual war. Like so many accidental civil rights heroes who came before her, Davis, a Democrat who was overwhelmingly elected as Rowan County clerk, has peacefully and graciously refused to violate her Christian conscience.

She has declined to sign her name to marriage certificates that defy God's natural design for the timeless institution. Instead she has requested, as a simple accommodation, that either her name be removed from the marriage licenses, thus eliminating her personalized acquiescence to the Supreme Court's novel attempt to usurp God's authority and redefine this cornerstone institution, or, alternatively, "to allow licenses to be issued by the chief executive of Rowan County or [by] developing a statewide, online marriage license process."

That's it. Simple, reasonable and fair. Our nation has a rich history of respecting the rights of conscientious objectors, and Kim Davis, like tens of millions of her brothers and sisters in Christ, is exactly that.

"There is absolutely no reason that this case has gone so far without reasonable people respecting and accommodating Kim Davis' First Amendment rights," said Mat Staver, Davis' attorney and head of Liberty Counsel, a Christian civil rights organization.

"This is a heaven or hell issue for me and for every other Christian that believes," Davis said on Thursday. "This is a fight worth fighting. ... I've weighed the cost and I'm prepared to go to jail."

And so she has.

Reasonable people can disagree on the propriety of Kim's actions. Some say that she was right in refusing to violate her conscience by signing her name to a legal document that presumes to solemnize that which God condemns. Still others say that she needs to either "do her job" or resign—that she took an oath and is violating that oath.

Nevertheless, all reasonable people must agree that imprisoning this innocent woman for her conscience is both an absolute outrage and gross violation of her constitutional liberties. Even the ACLU thought it was a bridge too far. The fact remains that people don't shed their First Amendment rights when they become government employees. 

Kim Davis swore to uphold the U.S. Constitution, the Kentucky Constitution and the laws of the Bluegrass state. When she took her oath, United States law, the Kentucky Constitution and the Kentucky Revised Statutes all reflected the millennia-old definition of natural marriage: "Only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Kentucky."

The Kentucky Legislature has yet to change this law one jot or tittle. Instead, five left-wing extremist lawyers in Washington, D.C., issued an opinion presuming to move the goalposts mid-game. Court opinions are not "the law of the land." Judges don't make laws—only the legislature can do that. Kim Davis is not defying the law; she is upholding it as codified.

Accordingly, she has repeatedly asked, "Under what law am I authorized to issue homosexual couples a marriage license?"

Neither Judge Bunning nor anyone else can answer.

Because no such law exists.

In a statement on Friday, Mat Staver made the same point: "Not long ago 75 percent of Kentuckians passed the state's marriage amendment. Today a Christian is imprisoned for believing what the voters affirmed: marriage is between a man and a woman. Five people on the Supreme Court imposed their will on 320 million Americans and unleashed a torrent of assaults against people of faith. Kim Davis is the first victim of this tragedy."

Indeed, many scoffed at our warnings that Christians will someday be forced to either endorse "gay marriage" or go to jail. Well, scoff no more. That day has arrived. In just two months since the high court's disgraceful Obergefell v. Hodges opinion, the full-on criminalization of Christianity has begun. You must either bow a knee before the false gods of same-sex "marriage" and "gay rights," or face the fiery "contempt of court" furnace. We have moved from anecdotal instances of anti-Christian discrimination to systemic religious persecution.

Here's the formula: 1) Force affirmation of homosexual behavior, abortion or some other institutionalized sin via judicial fiat; 2) Christian objects, refuses to disobey God and requests a reasonable religious accommodation; 3) accommodation is denied and Christian is jailed for "contempt of court."

You're going to hear that term a lot in coming days, weeks, months and years—"contempt of court." It's the straw man charge that will be utilized to imprison not just Christian public officials, but others as well. Christian business owners, lawyers, private sector employees, parents of school-age children who don't want their children indoctrinated by sexual anarchist propaganda and many others will be held in contempt of court, denied due process and incarcerated indefinitely.

The persecution isn't coming.

The persecution has arrived.

And that's what it means to be a Christ follower.

So pray for a million more like Kim Davis.

Become like Kim Davis.

Is she perfect? Certainly not. None of us is. Indeed, before Kim's transformational Christian re-birth four years ago, she was thrice divorced and "played in the devil's playground" for much of her life.

She was lost.

But now she's found.

God has an amazing way of taking empty, broken vessels, rebuilding their lives and then using them mightily for His glory and honor.

Stand, like Kim, fearlessly, lovingly and boldly for Christ, declaring, as did the apostles when faced with a similar decision, "We must obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29).

Indeed, as the Bible's Daniel, a "public official," boldly refused to disobey God and commit sin by worshiping a pagan king, so too has Kim Davis honored our Lord by refusing to bow before a pagan court—by refusing to call evil good and good evil.

They wanted to make an example of her.

Instead, they made a martyr of her.

And awakened a sleeping giant in the process.

Matt Barber is founder and editor-in chief of BarbWire.com. He is an author, columnist, cultural analyst and an attorney concentrating in constitutional law. Having retired as an undefeated heavyweight professional boxer, Matt has taken his fight from the ring to the culture war. (Follow Matt on Twitter:@jmattbarber).

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How the Current Wave of Anti-Christian Sentiment Could Backfire

 6/9/2015 JEREMY BURNS  charisma news

Voting booths (Facebook)

With everyone from pop culture icons to the mainstream media to Internet memes to the president himself seemingly bashing Christianity, is there no hope for a resurgence in the cultural battle?

According to one analyst, the widespread anti-Christian campaign may be ultimately be its own undoing. In a recent TIME magazine article, Dave Carney offers a compelling argument that the religious bullying and persecution could be the factor that unites and mobilizes Christians to once again become a force to be reckoned with in the public arena.

Despite findings that the percentage of those who identify as Christians has dropped sharply over the past decade or so, Carney points out that evangelicals have only seen a 0.9 percent decline. Further, while Christian denominations in the cited study lost 7.8 percent of the religious "market share" between 2007 and 2014, the fact remains that roughly 7 in 10 Americans still identify as Christian.

Though arguments could be made against the strength of conviction or faithfulness to Christianity for some of those self-reported respondents, the fact remains that—despite years of cultural leaders hammering against Christian beliefs, traditional values and religious freedom—the vast majority of Americans still chooses to identify as such.

Politically speaking, there is tremendous untapped potential for Christians to exert influence and power over the nation's direction. Unfortunately, much of the reason that potential remains untapped is Christians' own fault.

"Even before this troubling trend was reported, too many Christian voters had dropped out of the political process already," Carney writes. "In the past decade, about 78 million U.S. adults self-identified as evangelical in their beliefs, but reportedly only about 46 million were registered to vote, and only about 28 million cast a ballot in the 2004 presidential race."

With barely one-third of all evangelicals exercising their right to vote for this nation's leadership, it's no wonder that Christians' voices have continued to be silenced over the past decade—we've often chosen not to speak up when it matters most.

Identifying several recent escalations in "Christian-bashing" across the country, Carney believes that we are close to reaching the breaking point where Christians will eventually say enough is enough.

"These attacks on Christianity have the potential to create a populist movement across America, uniting Christians who have become disillusioned with government institutions and political leaders, and who are fed up with the attacks on the Christian values that built our nation," he writes. "The candidates who speak to evangelicals and their values, and who actively seek their support will find a massive latent block of voters waiting to be excited."

With the mounting attacks on faith and traditional values building seemingly daily, Carney thinks the looming 2016 presidential election may see a massive demographic shift in who turns out to the polls, one with massive consequences in the way Christians in America operate, and how the nation itself will treat people of faith.

"Those looking to forecast the end of the evangelical voting block should take a careful look at one of the lessons from Barack Obama's 2008 election—who comes out to vote matters," Carney writes. "Just a small increase in the turnout of the evangelical vote could change the political landscape dramatically.

"It is just these type of studies and reports on the demise of the religion that will drive even more public debate about the need for Christian values. The logical result will be a clearing of the pews on Election Day."

Anti-Christian Activists Will Defeat Themselves - MICHAEL BROWN

Benham Brothers

Anti-Christian Activists Will Defeat Themselves

5/10/2014 MICHAEL BROWN CHARISMA NEWS

For years now, anti-Christian activists have been pushing the hate button and accusing those of us who hold to biblical morality and family values of being intolerant, hate-filled bigots (and worse).

But this strategy, seen most recently in the attack on godly twin brothers, Jason and David Benham, will inevitably defeat itself. After all, when the alleged victims are the bullies and the alleged tolerant ones are full of bigotry, their rhetoric cannot be taken seriously.

Back in 2008, as Californians voted to preserve marriage with the Proposition 8 marriage amendment, the amendment was quickly dubbed Prop Hate, as if the only way anyone could believe that marriage was the union of a man and woman was if they were full of hate.

But that was only the beginning. In Sacramento, demonstrators held signs reading:

• Prop 8=American Taliban
• Ban Bigots
• Majority Vote Doesn’t Matter
• 52%=Nazi [this referred to the 52-48% vote in favor of Prop 8]
• Don’t Silence the Christians, Feed Them 2 the Lions
• Your Rights Are Next

Taliban? Nazis? Feed them to the lions?

This kind of demonization will only defeat itself in the long run exposing who the real bigots are.

In the last week, as soon as my newest book was released, I was accused of being the incarnation of the late Fred Phelps (infamous for his “God hates fags” protests), as well as branded the leader of my own “religious cult” that “requires human sacrifices.” (I’m not making this up.)

So, by writing a book filled with compassion and speaking of God’s great love for those who identify as LGBT, also urging the Church to recognize the unique struggles faced by those with same-sex attractions, I have become a hate-filled bigot and cult leader.

It’s like calling Shaquille O’Neal small or Bill Gates poor.

At some point reality kicks in – in this case, the moment someone reads the first pages of my book (or the middle pages or the last pages) – and instead of advancing their cause, the anti-Christian activists undermine their own.

In a blog post entitled, “The homophobic rantings of Michael L Brown,” Jay H. wrote, “Fred Phelps is dead. Long live Fred Phelps, apparently. Or rather his new incarnation: Michael L. Brown.”

Unfortunately for Jay H., when people actually read my book, rather than “homophobic rantings,” they find the opposite. As one reader noted, “[Brown] . . . freely uses life testimonies of people who were divinely delivered from homosexuality, and others NOT divinely delivered from homosexuality. This isn’t cherry-picked propaganda here...there are sections in this book that are very sobering for [an] evangelical believer to read.”

And so, readers quickly realize that I am no more the new Fred Phelps than I’m the new Michael Jordan, and the anti-Christian rhetoric exposes itself.

That’s what is happening with my good friends David and Jason Benham, Christian businessmen and committed husbands and fathers.

They were about to be the stars of a new reality show on HGTV that featured them helping hurting families get their dream homes, until a single post on RightWingWatch caused HGTV to pull the plug. (For those unfamiliar with RightWingWatch, the website is a project of Norman Lear’s ultra-liberal People for the American Way. The website references Christian family activist Phyllis Schafly 351 times, conservative political leader Gary Bauer 334 times, President Ronald Reagan 111 times, author Chuck Colson 57 times, and Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas 37 times, just to give a few examples. You can be sure most all of the references were not flattering.)

Shortly after HGTV announced its decision, a young man on YouTube opined that the Benham brothers were “the textbook definition of a psychopath” and that “they have no feelings, no consideration for other people.”

The problem, of course, is that the moment you get to know David and Jason – or even watch them on a TV interview for a few minutes or see them interacting with their families – you realize that they are not the ones who need help. It’s the young man on YouTube who needs help, and I can guarantee that if they had the opportunity, the Benhams would reach out to him directly to show him the love of God. (When I played part of this YouTube clip for Jason on my radio show, he responded with real compassion and concern.)

But it’s not just some anonymous YouTuber who is spouting such extreme, self-disqualifying anti-Christian rhetoric.

Dan Savage, a leading gay activist (and sex columnist) supported HGTV’s decision, comparing the Benham’s pro-family viewpoints to “white people” who used to “go on TV and say the most racist [expletive] imaginable (argue against legal interracial marriage, argue in favor of segregation) and keep their jobs and be invited back on TV to say that [expletive] a second time.”

Savage facetiously remarked that “hating the [expletive] out of gay people is something all Christians have in common,” titling his blog, “HGTV Cancels Reality Show After Twin Stars Anti-Gay Activism and Rabid Homophobia Exposed.”

What is rabid, however, is not the position of the Benhams. It is Dan Savage’s militant and vicious anti-Christian rhetoric that is rabid, and so, when reasonable, thinking people listen to Savage and to the Benham brothers, it’s easy to see who is filled with hate and who is filled with love.

Eventually, as those who claim to be champions of tolerance and diversity continue their crusade to silence and defame those who differ with them, they will ultimately defeat themselves.

Watch and see.

Michael Brown is author of Can You Be Gay and Christian? Responding With Love and Truth to Questions About Homosexuality and host of the nationally syndicated talk radio show The Line of Fire on the Salem Radio Network. He is also president of FIRE School of Ministry and director of the Coalition of Conscience. Follow him at AskDrBrown on Facebook or at @drmichaellbrown on Twitter.

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Confirmed: U.S. is Chief Facilitator of Christian Persecution - BreakingIsraelNews

This report from BreakingIsraelNews is stunning.

Confirmed: U.S. is Chief Facilitator of Christian Persecution

Posted by: Raymond Ibrahim January 21, 2014 , 2:29 pm

Prominent indicators confirm that the U.S. is the chief facilitator of the persecution of Christians around the world today.

According to the recently released 2014 World Watch List, which ranks the 50 nations where Christians are most persecuted, Syria is the third worst nation in the world in which to be Christian, Iraq is fourth, Afghanistan fifth, and Libya 13th. All four countries receive the strongest designation, “extreme persecution” (other designations are “severe,” “moderate,” and “sparse” persecution).

Aside from being so closely and harshly ranked, these four nations have something else in common: heavy U.S. involvement. Three—Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya—were “liberated” thanks to U.S. forces, while in the fourth, Syria, the U.S. is actively sponsoring “freedom fighters” against the regime, many of whom would be better labeled “terrorists.”

The Syrian situation alone indicts U.S. foreign policy. According to Reuters:

Open Doors, a non-denominational group supporting persecuted Christians worldwide, said on Wednesday it had documented 2,123 “martyr” killings, compared with 1,201 in 2012. There were 1,213 such deaths in Syria alone last year, it said. “This is a very minimal count based on what has been reported in the media and we can confirm,” said Frans Veerman, head of research for Open Doors. Estimates by other Christian groups put the annual figure as high as 8,000.”

While most Americans are shielded from the true nature of the war by the U.S. media’s reluctance to report on it, Arabic media, websites, and activists daily report and document atrocity after atrocity—beheadings and bombed churches, Christians slaughtered for refusing to convert to Islam, and countless abducted for ransom or rape—at the hands of those whom the U.S. supports.

Sen. John McCain meets with “Syrian rebels,” many of whom are not Syrian, and one of which is a known kidnapper (L – Muhammad Nour). (Photo: Raymond Ibrahim)

It’s enough to point out that “the largest massacre of Christians in Syria,” to quote a top religious leader, was left wholly unreported by any major U.S. news network.

At any rate, the statistics speak for themselves: Syria, which used to be religiously tolerant, is now, in the context of the United States’ trying to bring “democracy” to it, the third worst country in the world in terms of “extreme persecution” of Christians.

The Blaze reports that Dr. David Curry, president of Open Doors,

charged that the Obama administration has essentially declined to make the protection of religious minorities a priority . . . “There are many instances where the vacuum of leadership and spokesmanship has created a real problem,” said the human rights leader. “I would say that every significant data point on this year’s ‘2014 Watch List’ is worse—and I think a factor in it is a lack of leadership from Western governments including . . . the U.S. in terms of religious freedom.”

But it’s worse than that. Far from taking any action or providing leadership—or simply ceasing to support the terrorists responsible—the Obama administration recently tried to go to war with Syria on behalf of the “freedom fighters,” amazingly, in the name of “human rights” (Apparently the unsubstantiated rumor that Assad massacred people is enough for the U.S. to go to war, but the ongoing and well-documented massacres of Christians and other civilians at the hands of the opposition is not enough for the U.S. to stop supporting them.)

What’s worse, even the most misinformed mainstream-media-watching American today knows that the so-called “Arab Spring,” which was hailed to justify U.S. support for “rebels” of all stripes—in Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood (which months ago destroyed some 80 churches); in Libya, al-Qaeda, which has turned Benghazi into a terror zone; and now the “freedom fighters” in Syria—is not what it was touted to be.

In other words, at this point, whenever the U.S. intervenes in an Islamic nation, Islamists come to power. This is well demonstrated by the other three nations to which the U.S. brought “democracy” and where Christian minorities suffer “extreme persecution”:

• Afghanistan: The supposedly “moderate” Karzai government installed by the U.S. upholds many of the draconian laws enforced by the Taliban—including the apostasy law, fiercely persecuting those who seek to convert to Christianity—and, in 2011, under U.S. auspices, it destroyed Afghanistan’s last Christian church.
• Iraq: After the U.S. toppled Saddam Hussein, Christian minorities were savagely attacked and slaughtered, and dozens of their churches were bombed (see here for graphic images). Christians have been terrorized into near-extinction, with well over half of them fleeing Iraq.
• Libya: Ever since U.S.-backed, al-Qaeda-linked terrorists overthrew Qaddafi, Christians—including Americans—have indeed suffered extreme persecution. Churches have been bombed; Christians have been tortured and killed (including for refusing to convert); and nuns have been threatened.

Surely a common theme emerges here: Where the U.S. works to oust secular autocrats, the quality of life for Christians and other minorities takes a major nosedive. Under Saddam, Qaddafi, and Assad, Christians and their churches were largely protected.

Moreover, while George W. Bush was responsible for Afghanistan and Iraq, the argument can be made that, back then (2001 and 2003), this pattern of Islamic radicalization that erupts once autocrats are gone was less well known than it is today. There weren’t many precedents.

Conversely, the Obama administration has had both Afghanistan and Iraq to learn from—and yet still it supports Islamists and jihadis. But by now, what happens once they assume power—religious persecution, terror, oppression—is no longer a secret.

Incidentally, those who care little for the fate of Christians or other minorities in the Islamic world would do well to remember a simple truism: Wherever anti-Christian elements come to power, anti-American forces come to power. The two are synonymous.

Put differently, Muslim persecution of Christians is the litmus test of how radical an Islamic society has become. In all those Muslim nations that the U.S. has interfered in—Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Egypt (till the Egyptians revolted, to the chastisement of the U.S.), and now Syria—the increase of religious intolerance is a reflection of the empowerment of forces hostile to Western civilization.

I am often asked, “How can we help persecuted Christians?” At this point, one must respond: “How about starting with getting the U.S. government to stop being the chief facilitator of Christian persecution?” Altruism aside, it would be in the interests of all who value freedom, religious or otherwise—and especially their descendants.

Read more at http://www.breakingisraelnews.com/confirmed-u-s-chief-facilitator-christian-persecution/#v6YSdAg2LPBkP3LT.99